


Simple Kind of Love

by Severina



Category: Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Community: tv-universe, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-22
Updated: 2014-02-22
Packaged: 2018-01-13 10:30:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,031
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1223008
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Severina/pseuds/Severina
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>But in this place, this in-between place, there is only a gently falling rain and the whir of worn tires on the pavement and the man he loves.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Simple Kind of Love

**Author's Note:**

> Episode 202. Written for LJ's tv_universe for the prompt "four loves". (Inspiration also from Persnickett's supplemental prompt, 'rain'.)
> 
> * * *

Glenn doesn't want to be shuttled off to some old farmhouse, but T-Dog looks like he's going to pass out any second and Daryl gives him that look, so he grabs his backpack and bundles T into the car. They sputter their way up the road, cruising on fumes by the time they reach the _Greene_ sign at the end of the long driveway. Glenn babies the vehicle up the path, and tries not to think about what would have happened if they had still been on the move when the herd reached them on the interstate, if the little car had huffed and given up the ghost in the middle of that ravenous pack.

He watches T get stitched up, checks in on Rick and Lori. He waits and he prays. 

When he can't toss and turn on the Greene's lumpy sofa any longer, he gets up and does a circuit of the property.

He finds the bike leaning up against a back wall next to a noisy generator, a bit rusty and with one semi-soft tire, but it moves easily and he's pretty sure the tire will hold. He hops on before he can think twice. 

He's not going to set any speed records, not with the vehicles blocking the road, not with the threat of a walker staggering out from behind one of the stalled and abandoned cars. But he still sets a fairly good pace, and by the end of the first mile he realizes he actually feels good. The wind tugs his hair back, cools skin that still longs for the joys of air conditioning. His feet pump easily up and down on the pedals, and there's a nice warm comfortable burn in his calves. He feels alive in a way that he hasn't since that last Sunday a few weekends before the end: sitting on his grandmother's porch, sipping her homemade lemonade, listening to the sounds of Jimmy Dorsey drifting faintly from the old floor-model record player in the living room. 

When the first raindrops hit his face as he approaches the RV, Glenn actually laughs. 

The laugh might be what saves his life, because a second later he sees Daryl step out from behind an old sedan and slowly lower his bow. The sight actually quickens his heart, adds to the feeling of lightness that he's carried with him since shutting the gate behind him at the Greene farm. Behind him are worried parents, a gunshot boy; ahead of him an old man, a woman crying for a lost little girl. But in this place, this in-between place, there is only a gently falling rain and the whir of worn tires on the pavement and the man he loves.

"Hey," Glenn calls softly. He detours away from the Winnie, skids to a stop in front of Daryl with a flourish that makes the ten year old in him damn proud. 

"Thought you was a walker. Could've shot you in the goddamn head!" Daryl hisses. "You nuts or somethin'?"

"Probably," Glenn says. He shakes the wet hair out of his eyes, dismounts and leans the bike against the fender. Not even Daryl's scowl can shake his mood, this sense of buoyant optimism that has carried him across two miles of blacktop. He wonders what would happen if he were to suggest that they just continue on, leave everyone behind, just ride across the country with the moonlight on their shoulders. 

"The hell you doin' back here?"

"Had to see you," Glenn says. 

Daryl stands up straighter, looks past him down the road as though he can see all the way to the turn-off, past the fields and trees to the big house in the middle of nowhere. "Something happen? The boy okay?"

A gunshot boy named Carl. Worried parents named Rick and Lori. A frail woman named Carol crying softly over her missing daughter. Their friends, the people who are becoming their family, and there is no leaving them behind. Glenn knows that, wouldn't really want to. Riding away into the mist is just a dream. In the morning the rain will clear, and the sun will shine brightly on all the world's imperfections, and they'll deal. 

Still, for now he just wants to exist in this little bubble, pretend the crazy world around them doesn't exist for a moment. "No change. Just… had to see you," he repeats.

He shrugs helplessly, because he knows that it will be almost impossible to explain the surge that went through him when he saw that bicycle, the overwhelming urge to get back to the caravan. No way to explain to his sensible, practical sort-of-boyfriend that he'd spend part of the night praying to a God he isn't even sure exists, or to make him understand how the light rain on his face felt almost like a spiritual cleanse after all the horror of the past few weeks.

Except that maybe Daryl feels the same spell in the air that he does, because he merely grunts and reaches out to snag at his damp T-shirt. He lets Daryl tug him forward and wrap two strong arms around his waist, lets himself lean his full weight against Daryl's body and smiles when he feels Daryl prop his chin on his head. For once there's no hesitation in Daryl's arms, no stiffness in his body that has to be eased away with soft hands and quiet words. Glenn settles, and knows that he won't be pushed roughly away by the sound of approaching footsteps or the murmur of other people's voices. 

He lays a palm on Daryl's chest, relishes the steady beat of his heart. In a moment he'll have to break away, return to the farmhouse before he's missed and people worry. In the morning there will be a renewed search for a little girl that may end in heartbreak, a desperate operation to save a boy's life that may end the same way. Tomorrow there will be walkers to kill and food to gather and all the other little things that make up survival in this new world.

But right now they have each other, and the rain.


End file.
